Letters to the Editor Thursday

My heart weeps for the sad Christians dying of starvation, dehydration, and bullets under the torrid skies of northern Iraq.

As direct descendants of first century Christians, they face genocide at the hands of homicidal psychopaths using arms we left behind. Their blood is on our hands because only the United States had the capability to save them, and we didn’t.

When the United States retreats, the world suffers. When Stalin blockaded West Berlin in 1948, America saved starving Germans with the massive airlift.

In 1973, when Israel was running low on arms needed to repel the Egyptian and Syrian surprise invasion, Nixon ordered a massive resupply of military arms.

Our military strategists had plans for ISIS months ago that would have prevented the genocide of innocent Christians, but the president dithered again. And although many believe we should not be the world’s policeman, if not America then who?

Unless those plans meet the same fate as our president’s college records, history will judge us and the judgment will not be pretty.

But it is not what the world thinks, or what is politically expedient, that should move a president to action. I wonder if the First Lady is still proud of America?

JAMES SICKEL

Savannah

When America retreats, bad things get worse

Man’s inhumanity to man is on full display due to resent events: Syria’s use of chemical weapons, Boko Haran’s abductions and mass killings, the Gaza strip, the downed Malaysian flight and ISIS’s mass murder and beheadings in Iraq.

So much for the singing of Kumbaya while holding hands around the camp fire. So much for the reset button with Russia, U.N. leadership, red lines drawn and ignored, hoping for the best and “leading from behind.”

The world has a lot of evil. When the U.S. steps back from its leadership position, bad things get worse.

Being the leader of the world is difficult, but fighting evil makes you human. Ignoring evil is not an option. This is not a call for boots on the ground, but it is a call for the U.S. to retake our position as world leader.

GUY RANDOLPH

Savannah

We need more places to earn our money

With the rhetoric for a new stadium for the Savannah Sand Gnats and a civic center increasing, I am reminded of what my father taught me many years ago about the difference between wants and needs.

So forgive me if I sound like I am lecturing. But do we really need more places to spend our “leisure” dollars? Or, do we need more places to earn those dollars?

My wife and I have spent many pleasant evenings at Grayson Stadium, and I am sure that a new facility would increase our enjoyment. But I feel that we need jobs, an increased police presence in our communities, better schools, reduced traffic, and a cleaner environment.

We don’t need more places to spend our money; we need more places to earn our money.

When we have accomplished this goal, then we can address leisure spending. I would rather see a beautiful Gulfstream, or Apple, or Samsung factory on that Riverwalk property producing good wages for thousands of hard-working Savannahians. We need to keep our tourists happy and safe.

We need a mayor and city council focused on growth, not buying demolished properties from state senators. Please let’s prioritize our needs; the wants will follow.

The Bacon Park Neighborhood has made it through hurricanes and 100-year storm events and never flooded. It’s probably the only neighborhood that hasn’t cost taxpayers millions of dollars for infrastructure improvements.

In 2007, the city of Savannah installed a stormwater system in Bacon Park to divert stormwater out of another neighborhood.

The FEMA lots on Betty Drive are the result of emergency vehicles creating a wake and sending water into about eight homes. It was the option of the property owners to sell their homes to the city, which then purchased them with FEMA grant money.

Without public notice or any hearings, the residents of Betty Drive were awakened on a Saturday morning to the sound of bulldozers digging out a holding pond on vacant lots purchased with this FEMA grant money.

The Bacon Park neighborhood was transformed into a drainage basin for what I presume is to alleviate flooding in their preferred neighborhoods. Property values bottomed out, our FEMA rating was changed, private property was damaged and insurance premiums tripled.

FEMA only pays the adjusted property value once storm water enters your home. That rate is about 40 percent of its original value.

I believe it is a felony to make a false claim for damages in order to receive a FEMA buyout of your property. It’s called FEMA fraud and abuse. I encourage Savannah residents to pay close attention to stormwater mitigation plans proposed by the city. There are laws on the books in Georgia and it is trespassing for someone, anyone, even municipalities, to divert stormwater onto your property.

ELIZABETH SCOTT

Director

Bacon Park Neighborhood Assn.

Savannah

Why a native Georgian supports Michelle Nunn

Michelle Nunn is right on target. It’s time to send people to Washington who represent the constituents and not the money bags that send lobbyist to Congress with bills written in some big business office.

We have congressmen accepting these bills because they are in the pockets of the group that the lobbyists work for.

Washington needs changing. Our representatives waste time avoiding important issues and nitpicking foolishness. They have the best benefits in the world and give us poor service. Citizens work harder every day for much less.

I don’t know Ms. Nunn, but I do know from what I’ve heard she is not one of the good ol’ boys that call her a lightweight because she does not fit their standards.

She was born and raised in Georgia and comes from a strong Georgia family and she will keep Georgia on her mind when she gets to Washington. She would not be bought, I believe.

I, as a native Georgian, don’t like comments sent to the editor by people who have come to live in Georgia for a little while.

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It can be argued, though to my thinking not convincingly, that they would have occurred whoever was president. Obama has invited so many of them by providing openings to the evil. By thinking his powers of persuasion and talking purdy will carry the day. By running the White House like you'd run a faculty lounge.

We have a little more than two years left of this political pathos and if he's dumped before then we get Uncle Joe. Hurry calendar!

I just wonder what we do after a third tower goes down, spot them a fourth?

James you forgot the birth certificate! Why does the right have to tear someone down to try and make their side look ‘right’? This is what Rush Limbaugh had to say about Robin Williams’ death.

“He had everything, everything that you would think would make you happy. But it didn’t. Now, what’s the left’s worldview in general? What is it? It you had to attach not a philosophy but an attitude to a leftists worldview, it’s one of pessimism and darkness, sadness. They’re never happy are they? They’re always angry about something. No matter what they get, they’re always angry,”

So Rush says people on the ’left’ are unhappy and suicidal! Classy to use this man's death to try and make a political point and this man is held up in high esteem on the right!

I am a proud American veteran who has at times been not so proud of what my country has lied about (Gulf of Tomkins or WMD’s) to get us into a war where the only winners were the people that make big money on wars. I joined the service one month after the Gulf of Tomkins incident. How many more young Americans that should have the rest of their lives to live in our great country have to die for our ‘war machine’ economy, before we learn that we are not the world’s policeman?

It is terrible about what is happening to all those people in the Middle East. You say “Their blood is on our hands because only the United States had the capability to save them, and we didn’t.” Do you feel the same way about kids dying on our boarder or we sending them back to maybe be killed or raped and sold into a life prostitution? I have trouble understanding some peoples’ double standards.